Jury visits home of Ohioan charged in 11 deaths

June 27, 2011

ANDREW TOBIAS

Staff Writer

A 30-year-old Westerville woman will be on probation for two years and serve 40 hours of community service after she drunkenly sprayed breast milk at sheriff’s deputies after assaulting her husband at a wedding last June.

Municipal Judge David M. Gormley also ordered Stephanie S. Robinette to pay a $200 fine. Robinette lost her job as a teacher at a Columbus elementary school for special needs students after details of the embarrassing June 25 incident were reported widely in the news media.

Robinette will be forbidden from drinking alcohol while she is on probation.

The judge chided Robinette, saying her “infamous” actions the day she was arrested, which included using abusive and vulgar language toward deputies, were “shameful.”

“I certainly trust I will never see you back in here again,” Gormley said. “I think teachers are in a position of trust, and you seriously violated that trust with your behavior.”

Robinette pleaded guilty last month to misdemeanor charges of obstructing official business and assault on a family member. Three other charges of domestic violence, resisting arrest and disorderly conduct were dismissed as part of a plea deal.

The charges stem from an incident that occurred while she and her husband attended a wedding at a conference center off Sawmill Parkway. The bride’s father, an off-duty Delaware County sheriff’s deputy, called 911 to report a domestic violence incident.

Craig Robinette told deputies his wife hit him several times before locking herself in the couple’s car. When two deputies attempted to remove her from the car, Robinette said she was a nursing mother with a nine-month-old. She then removed her right breast and sprayed them with breast milk, according to Delaware County Sheriff Walter L. Davis III.

“If there were a form of punishment associated with public shaming, Stephanie’s case would qualify,” Koffel said.

Craig Robinette, who filed for a divorce in Franklin County Common Pleas Court on July 15, appeared in court Monday. He spoke briefly before Robinette was sentenced. He said he wasn’t sure that alcohol was the sole extent of his wife’s problems, and asked that a no contact order remain in place.